


souver’inan isala hamin

by jillyfae



Series: together we are stronger than the one [4]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Backstory, Dalish, Developing Relationship, Friendship, Gen, Herald's Rest, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-31
Updated: 2015-07-31
Packaged: 2018-04-12 04:36:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4465691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jillyfae/pseuds/jillyfae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>weary eyes need resting</i>
</p><p> </p><p>A friendly round of drinks ... with a curious storyteller seeking answers, and a group of people who are none of them quite friends. Yet. (<i>aka</i> This is all Varric's fault.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	souver’inan isala hamin

"Have you ever been in love, Inquisitor?" 

Varric looks like he doesn't care, is just making conversation. He's not even _quite_ looking at me, focused instead on the careful balance of springs and hooks that he's holding between his fingers. Probably a new trap. I wonder if he'll show me how he made it, later. 

But for all the smooth movement of his hands, I don't think he's worried about his latest project. There's a note in his voice I can't quite interpret. Oddly disappointing, that; he is so much better at speaking than most, so seldom makes it difficult for me to understand. 

"Of course," I feel my head tilt; my left ear turns closer towards him. Dorian leans back in his chair, clearly planning to enjoy the show. 

Blackwall is too stiff, and he keeps his head down. I'm not sure why he joined us here tonight, when he still hasn't said a word. 

Especially considering how much he and Dorian just _adore_ each other's company. 

I am glad of it though. Perhaps that is enough. 

"Most people don't seem to find that answer easy." Varric's fingers still, and he lifts his head as he speaks, and it's disconcerting, having all his attention focused on me like that. I think perhaps I understand something about what it must have felt like for Hawke, as he watched her life and put it to paper. 

"Why not?" I shrug, trying not to wonder at how different her life felt to her, versus what we all read. How different his version of me might seem, from who I think I am. "Have you not ever been in love?" 

There's a shiver in the air, here at our table on one side of the Rest, and I wonder at it, so much heartbreak in such a small space. But now that I've thought of her, it's easy enough to figure out what to ask next. "You love your Hawke enough to have hidden her from the unknown motives of people hunting her, don't you?" 

_To hide her still, even from us, for all you spread your stories over us like a mother tucks in her young, for all your smile reminds me of Hahren Mathus by the fire, looking over the Clan._

_Or is she hiding from you now, desperate for a chance at peace?_

That thought twists in my chest, heavy and dark, _what if Iftel, Canaral, what if they survived, and never told me, never wanted me to see them again, not again ..._

I am grateful to see Dorian snort, the shift in his face and shoulders clear, even if I cannot hear the soft sound he makes. I let my worries fade, hope Varric's are not as dark as I fear, and I meet Dorian's eyes, mirror the small smile I see there as we both picture Cassandra's _face_ when she realized who had come to help us, realized Varric had contacted a Hawke, if not _The_ Hawke she'd been looking for, that the both of them, and perhaps Mac Tir as well, must know where the Champion is, or at least where she _was,_ and none of them were going to tell her, would not tell any of us. 

Varric shakes his head, but there's a hint of a smile as he pulls one slim piece of metal free and places it on the table. "Not quite what I meant." 

"Why not?" I'm repeating myself, I know, but I never seem to understand these conversations. 

At least it's a familiar sort of confusion, unlike most of the other things these _shem_ seem to value. Canaral and I used to have the same almost-argument once a moon, until Ithel threatened to turn us into spiders to get us to stop. 

"Why isn't it what you meant?" My voice is too sharp, _Ithel gently chiding, Canaral shrugging his whole body, eye rolling hard enough the white catches the light,_ and I swallow, swallow, until my throat feels raw. "I can tell you love her, your eyes are different when you talk about her." 

He doesn't answer, just sighs at my question, as if he thinks I'm being coy. I am terrible at coy. 

"Is love so unusual, has it been so begrudged in your life, that you can count its appearances?" I take a breath, swallow my voice before it rises too high. "That you need to find the edges and lock it up into little boxes, yes _this sort_ is what I meant, but _that love_ isn't?" 

Dorian sighs, an almost soundless shift of air beside me, but when I look at him he just blinks at me, slowly. 

I'm not sure if that means I said something very right, or very wrong. 

Varric still doesn't answer me, eyes narrowed as he glances up, looks for something in my face, something I do not understand so cannot give him. 

"He was trying to ask about _romance_ , I do believe." Dorian leans forward, and I could kiss him, though he'd probably think it was because of the conversation, rather than the clear tones of his voice, the wide expressive spread of his hands. The way he makes sense, when no one else does. Even when he's _wrong,_ he's bright and loud and strong, and I can see the path of his passions as they led to his words. "So, love _and_ sex. Very nosy, our Deshyr Tethras." 

Varric grunts in his throat. He's not fond of that title, I've noticed. Probably why Dorian likes to use it. 

"And have you all loved everyone you've ever slept with?" The noise caught in my throat feels remarkably like the one Cassandra makes around us so often. "Not loved them because you didn't? Would you grieve your Felix more if you'd kissed him, less if you hadn't?" 

Dorian's eyes go too wide, and my breath catches. "I am sorry, that is none, that is not ... I did not mean to be cruel." 

He blinks, and there's sorrow there, and then a hint of that soft smile, the one he usually hides, before he nods, and takes a breath deep enough I can see the lift of his chest and shoulders, and all his thoughts are hidden again behind elegance and extravagant manners. 

I turn towards Varric. My eyes burn, and I feel I owe Dorian something more, to ease the stab I took at him, all accidentally. "Should my cousin Nala hurt more over the brother I got killed, or the husband?" 

"You didn't kill them." I can feel Blackwall's words, I do not need the sound of them to know them. "It's not your fault." 

I look at him directly, the first time all day he's met my eyes, possibly the first time since we returned to Skyhold, maybe even since we left the Coast. His are too pale, and I'm sure mine are too dark, beneath the green shine left by the Mark. What a pair we'd make, if he'd let us. "I didn't save them, either." 

"Even you can't save everyone." There's warmth now, in the lines of his face, in the light in his eyes, in the texture of his voice. _If anyone could, it would be you,_ he says without saying, and it helps, a little, to know that whatever is coming next, he does not want to push us apart any more than I do. 

It doesn't mean he _won't,_ I know, but at least it's clear he would regret whatever need that pushed him to it. 

"But I have to, don't I?" _My place, my purpose, same as it always was, just more._ The hand with the Mark flexes, fingers spread wide to stretch the palm, though it can never stretch enough, never quite ease the knot, the aching hole in the middle. _Please, Mythal, I do not want to fail again. I do not think I could bear it._

Varric snorts, and his voice is too low, too rough; even though he's right across from me I cannot figure out the words. I think he says something about his Hawke, because that look is back in his eyes again. 

I sigh, and resist the urge to rub my ears, as if there was some way to force them to work together, beyond rest and the luck of a new sunrise. "What is it you want to know, Varric?" 

He shrugs, placing his project on the table and lifting his hands to spread them wide. His expression is almost innocent, despite the sharp glance of his eyes back to my face. "You're a hard woman to figure out. Just trying to put the pieces together." 

"There are no hidden pieces." I let my hands lift, twist, fingers framing my face, pointing at my quiver beside us, and the left hand spreads wide at my side, before they both drop down to my lap, _Dalish, archer, Mark._ "I am unsure what else you think there is to find." 

"You're very well-spoken. Patient, good at negotiations, good at reading body-language." 

I raise my eyebrows. The _for an elf_ positively dripped off the end of that sentence. He's clearly _trying_ to insult me. 

It's working. 

"No offense, but most Dalish don't care a bit about how they sound to anyone not the Dalish, but you! You talk to everyone." 

"Oh dear, is our resident author jealous?" Dorian winks at me, and I cough, the sudden amusement too startling to hide properly. "You're too nice, my dear. You must stop it, immediately." 

"See!" Varric throws his hands up in the air. "That's exactly what I mean. The Dalish hunter from the middle of nowhere shows up and makes besties with the arrogant Tevinter Magister." 

"And again," Dorian sighs, putting his hand to his heart as if it pains him, " _not_ a Magister." 

_Inland Free Marches is hardly the middle of nowhere._ I want to grumble, but it's unlikely to have an impact on Varric. _Meaningless details,_ he'd wave a hand and continue, regardless. 

Maybe ignoring him will be more effective? I shift in my chair, just enough to face Dorian directly. "I see you didn't argue with the arrogant part of the description?" I smile at him, and he clicks his tongue. 

"Is it truly _arrogance_ if my good opinion of myself is all based on _fact_?" 

Varric ignores him. "You soothe Mother Giselle enough to get her help, hire on a qunari spy, adopt the Mages to stop their Rebellions, and if you haven't charmed the pants off the only sane Warden I've ever met, sorry Carver, it's only because you haven't thought to ask him to take them off yet, and you _still_ have tea with the Ambassador every week." I blink at him as he finally takes a breath. "If I put all that in a book, no one would believe me." 

There's a grunt from Blackwall. Who has actually been quite resistant to my charms, not that I've attempted anything in regards his pants. 

I can see Varric's shoulders lift with the strength of his next breath. 

I blink again. 

"I have had tea with the lovely Lady Josephine," Dorian offers at last. "The quality and service is exquisite." 

Varric turns on him. "She doesn't even seem scared of Iron Lady!" 

"Everyone's scared of Madame de Fer." It is difficult not to laugh, he sounds so very disgusted with me. "It's only polite." 

His chin drops, and his head shakes, and his sigh is heavy enough even I can hear it. "Polite. She's polite." 

"I'm not much use as a bodyguard if no one lets me in the room." My shrug is uneven, my shoulder curling uncomfortably. "Why not be polite?" 

"Bodyguard?" 

Dorian makes an odd half-aborted motion with his hands, a visible echo to Varric's one word. 

"Is that not the right word?" We haven't saved enough elvish to really make a proper conversation out of it, but there are days I wonder if the Common I speak bears much resemblance to the dialects the humans trade between themselves, so many different notes and flavors, all tangled together. "I was the," I tilt my head, wondering how the title would translate. "The Second's Shield?" 

_Terrible shield, broken and flawed, not there to stand between him and his fate. Sixteen years of success hardly matters, when failure comes._

I sigh, and swallow, and twist my wrist. "Isn't that what I am now, too? Only more people to shield, from holes in the sky." 

_As if I can stand between the whole world and the monsters. A single bodyguard, takes one shot, and then they fall, and who will guard the next body?_

_And then they give me a sword to recognize me. Stupid_ shem'len. 

Varric snorts, lifts a single loose spring free and twists it tighter between his fingers. "Be nice to people, so they can get close enough to kill you?" 

"No, of course not." I smile, and I'm rather sure there are too many teeth showing, as Dorian goes too still, still enough Varric notices and lifts his head again to look at me, the coiled wire loosening again as his hands stop moving. "If I know I'm on my best behavior, and some stupid _shem'len_ attack regardless, I don't have to feel badly for killing all of them." 

"Huh." Varric's face eases, though it's definitely not a smile. "That's more like it." 

"Or not _as_ badly." My voice is soft, and I'm not sure I can even hear myself, or if it's just that I know what I'm saying. "After a certain point, there's no washing all the blood away." 

_Stained cloth and canvas, skin torn and pale and cold, mud too dark, too heavy, no water to soothe the ground, to lighten the smell, thick and sharp and dark._

Varric swallows. He knows a thing or two about blood, I can tell. Blackwall moves, so I notice, it's impossible for me not to notice him, though it is a subtle change, his shoulders curling in, and I know, somehow, this conversation hurts him. 

Perhaps it is a pain he needs, to decide whatever it is he has been considering since we left the Coast. 

I do him the courtesy of ignoring it, however. For now. While we're in public. 

I lean forward instead, closer to Varric, 'til I am focusing just on him. "I don't want to watch more blood spill, if I can help it. And if I can't, I want to make sure it's not from _my_ people." 

There's a pause, silent but not restful, as Varric puts the spring down again, lays his hands flat against the table, gaze steady on my face the whole while. 

"And how did we, they," Varric's head tilts, a rough aim at the walls of this so-called Herald's Rest, at Skyhold, possibly at the whole world beyond these walls, "end up as _your_ people?" 

My eyes close softly, as I consider just why I have claimed these people, let them claim me, despite the weight of Andraste's name on their lips, the entirely different sort of weight it places on my heart. But it's not that difficult a question either. Heavy to carry, but not hard to decipher. I open my eyes again, and look at him. 

"You know I cannot save everyone, but you come anyways." 

"It helps that we're pretty, doesn't it?" Dorian's voice slithers in between us, and I sit back with a sigh. 

"No one's as pretty as you, Dorian." 

"Well that goes without saying." He grins, and lifts his mug, waits for me to meet it with my own. "But thank you for saying it, nonetheless." 

I swallow my ale, and Varric chuckles. 

"You know, if I went on _and on_ about what a wonderfully handsome example of a dwarf I am-" 

I roll my eyes. 

"That is what would happen, yes. But when _he_ does it, you smile." 

_I saw Dorian take someone else's magic, throw out the hour he needed and twist it to his will in minutes. We watched the world end, and he dragged me back here to stop it, and no one,_ no one _, will ever be as beautiful as this man was when we landed back when we belonged, and he condemned one of his oldest friends because it was_ right. 

I just shrug. Any more would make everyone uncomfortable. Varric would deserve it, as he quite clearly started it, but Dorian and Blackwall do not. 

"You seem very sure." Blackwall, again, at last, and his voice is too slow, too thin, but he's _trying,_ and I could kiss him too, for completely different reasons, though clearly that would be a terrible choice to make at this precise moment. 

"What, that Dorian's pretty?" I lift my chin, _yes I am sure,_ and we both know I don't mean Dorian. "He tells me often enough, it would be impossible to forget." 

"Oh, I didn't have to tell you at all," Dorian clicks his tongue and shakes his head, a smile glinting in his eyes, sharper and colder than the ones he usually shares with me. "You figured it out on your own. It's everyone _else_ who fails to appreciate me." 

Blackwall grunts, but he doesn't retaliate, and I take it as a victory, of some sort. 

Varric just sighs, and shakes his head. There's a hint of a smile on his face, at last, as he concedes the conversation, but I know it's not really over. He's still turning over something in his head, a shadow behind his eyes. 

He'll ask again, whatever it is. 

Maybe I'll be able to answer him, next time. 

Maybe not. He's hard to figure out, Deshyr and storyteller, well-traveled for all he seems to hate to wander; too sharp to stay quietly in the background, too soft-hearted for spying, or so he says. 

He also says he lies. 

An honest liar, perhaps, trying to find the line in someone else's story, that moment between truth and fiction that will reveal more than words ever say. 

Or maybe I'm wrong, entirely and completely, as he only waits until I've finished my drink, and Dorian waves imperiously for more, Blackwall snorting derisively under his breath at the motion. Only waits until he's rearranged his collection of bits and pieces into a slightly different shape, elegant and spiraling down into itself, and can lean back with a sigh and watch me as he speaks. 

"You _do_ seem very self-assured, Inquisitor." 

I resist the urge to let my head fall onto the table with a thud. If he'd just straight out _ask_ his Forgotten question ... "Would it make you feel better if I wasn't?" 

"Might make more sense." His hands spread wide again, putting on his show, a hint of a smile as his trap stays steady even when his fingers leave it. "Can't imagine a Dalish archer was trained on how to lead hundreds of humans around." 

"No one's trained to fight demons from the sky." Blackwall's voice is tight, annoyed on my behalf, and I feel my jaw ease, an almost smile caught somewhere in my chest. "Do you have a problem with her tactics, Varric?" 

Varric's smile deepens, a shadow in the corner of his mouth, and I'm forced to wonder if _this_ is the point, poking at Blackwall and Dorian both, with me as his messenger, rather than his goal. "Of course not, Hero." 

"Besides," I interrupt before he can rile anyone up some more. "The Commander does most of the leading of hundreds of humans. Our Ambassador manages them, the Spymistress scares the rest of them ... I just hunt down holes in the sky. You do agree there's a chance a Dalish was trained how to hunt, at least?" 

He tilts his head in acknowledgment of the point. 

"I only need to babysit a few of you silly humans along the way." 

He snorts. "Hope you're not counting me in there." 

"You're more _shem'len_ than _durgen'len,_ I'd say." It's my turn to spread my hands, to lay my words before him. "Sky-touched, isn't that what they call it?" 

He pulls his head back, and I almost laugh, as I realize I've finally startled him. 

I swallow it though, as I think perhaps I may have offended him as well. 

_Serves him right. Maybe._

I consider an apology. 

But then he smiles again, and it's different this time, honest and almost sad as he shakes his head, as he takes one broad finger and pushes gently against a single straight trigger piece, not hard enough to set it off, of course, just enough it shifts slightly at the pressure. "Sometimes you remind me a bit of Hawke." 

I feel my breath catch, thinking of her, so much more than just words on a page, though still a mystery. All I have are echoes, the twists of her story in Varric's book, hinting at depths of sorrow even he didn't quite dare spell out in public, the light in Varric's eyes when he goes quiet, thinking of her, and the Commander's rare smile almost appearing, though his eyes are still sad, at the mention of her name. The way her brother stood much too still as he stared down Cassandra, tall and broad and heavy, as if trying to ease the weight of grief and duty that must rest on her shoulders, even from so far away. The way the last place she touched ended, the way it almost ended the whole world, in blood and fire and shadows. 

She's younger than I am, his Hawke. Would have been younger still when they met, brash and desperate to prove she'd earned her _vallaslin,_ fresh enough to still sting against her skin, if she was one of The People. I'd settled into my place in Ithel's shadow by the time we'd heard of the Blight, of the horrors that tried to swallow Ferelden whole. Who was she, back then, fleeing home to land in Kirkwall, city of slaves and stone and soot and chains? 

I blink, as the shift of Varric's shoulders says _something_ , discomfort and charm oddly clashing against each other. 

_Ah,_ I feel it settle, at last, an understanding. He's _worried._ He'd have Mythal's mark, too, be set to guard and protect in his Clan, if he had one. 

Believes he failed his, just as I failed mine. 

Is sure he won't survive such a failure again. 

The echo of that thought aches, all the way down my spine. 

"How old do you think I am, Varric?" 

Dorian coughs, Blackwall swallows too hard, a painful grunt down his throat, and Varric goes quite stunningly still, before his smile returns, wry and twisted. 

"Not sure there's a safe answer to that question." He grins at me, and I smile back, completely involuntarily. "Though I'm beginning to think perhaps I need to add a few more years to my estimate." 

I click my tongue, my smile still softening my mouth. "Coward." 

Varric nods, cheerful agreement. 

"Would you like a clue?" I settle back in my chair, shoulders loose against the wood, wait for another nod, slower than the last. "Do you know what an _arlathven_ is?" 

"Meeting of the Clans." His voice is brisk. He is comfortable with the few Dalish things I've spoken of around him. I'd wondered how true his stories of a Dalish friend in Kirkwall were, when I read them in his infamous Champion's Tale. Now I only wonder how she does, still apparently tending to the lost and lonely in the shadow of her _vhenadahl_ , even so long since the end of Hawke's story, because the truth of her is so very clear in his eyes. 

"Which happen how often?" I ask. I feel my eyebrows lift, my smile still there, somehow, around these ridiculous _shem._

_My_ shem. 

"Every ten years." Now he leans back, lifts his chin as he looks at me. "Been to a few, have you?" 

I lift my hand, only my thumb tucked in against my palm, and wiggle all four fingers. 

Dorian coughs, and Blackwall grunts, and there is a petty sort of glee, sharp in my chest, as Varric's eyes widen. 

_Shem'len_ age differently, always look at us and guess too young, but even for The People I've always had a deceptively smooth and open sort of face. 

Got me out of more than my fair share of trouble when I was fostering. 

Kept a fair few _shem'len_ off guard just long enough ... 

The glee fades, and I swallow the burn down the back of my throat, feel my jaw shift with the force of it. I shrug, ignore the way Varric's brows frown as he tries to follow where my thoughts have gone. _Not tonight, storyteller, not tonight._ "Not that I remember much of that first one beyond the smell of more fires than usual, of stews and kebabs with different spices than we ever had." I try and let the shadows in my memories drift away, though they keep coming back tonight, time and time again, try to remember instead the food, the songs, the slow and steady tug of leather between my fingers. "Had to help braid extra cords for all the hand-fastings. Have to _every time,_ you'd think somewhere along the line we'd have learned to make more in the first place?" 

I close my eyes on that, but it's too late, I feel the heat trying to spill past my lashes, because it was at the last one, so close and yet so far away, the very world broken since then, that Canaral and Ithel and I were chosen, our fates as always tied together, our futures changed, all to set us on the path to the Conclave. 

To set them on a path to the Beyond, and leave me behind. 

Leave me here, surrounded by _shem'len_ , fighting monsters from legends, when my Clan most needed me. 

When I most needed them. 

I was not there to sing Ithel and Canaral to rest, to tell their children of their bravery, their brilliance, of Ithel's soft heart and strong spine, of Canaral's sharp tongue and quick smiles, to share their lives as we made them one last dinner. I was not there by Nala's side to cut Canaral's cord, to tie the ends to hers, to throw the rest on the fire, faded and thinner after twenty years, but still strong, still good, _we'd made it to last, it should have had more time, you and he, we should have had ..._

It's enough. 

The shadows win tonight. 

As they should. 

I breathe, slow and deep, and let them in, dark and heavy but familiar, nonetheless, and I wonder why I tried to pretend they weren't there all along, settled deep in my chest, forever and always. 

I can never go back, not now that I have lost my grip on the ties that used to bind us, not now that I have failed them, lost them, landed on a path without them, for the first time in my life. 

I will never again be _banal'ras_ , will never find a shadow deep enough to rest in, instead caught and tangled in these bitter remnants, just enough to slow, never enough to heal. 

_What will I become instead?_

I open my eyes, and Dorian's gaze is too wide, wary of me at last, _yes, you should be wary, I could kill you for who and what you were, for the People whose lives you never even saw before you came here, and it would be right, it would be just, payment for all that pain ..._

Varric has gone still, a mouse in a field when the owl flies, and yes, _yes,_ I could be Andruil's Messenger, could look down on them all, hunt them and clean their blood from between my claws, could teach them what it is to know the world would not mourn their passing, would not even care enough to be glad they were dead, would forget them as soon as the hunger rose again. 

_Nothing worse than that slow decay, no curse more powerful than Forgotten ..._

"My lady," Blackwall's voice is soft, so soft, _down floating through the air,_ and I turn, and his hand moves, the barest turn of his wrist, as if unsure whether it would be a comfort or a curse to try and reach out, to try and touch, and something breaks, a crack behind my ribs, sharp and silent, because no, _no,_ he would not forget, never, but neither could a Goddess' Monster be his lady. 

I smile at him, and my throat tastes of salt. 

I see the depth of Blackwall's breath as his shoulders lift, the careful placement of Varric's hands across the table, the way the light collects and gleams and fades into the darkness of Dorian's hair. 

My sins are not so few I can spare the gift of mercy once offered to me; how can I not offer it, in turn? How can I not thank Dorian, Varric, my Inquisition, _my people,_ for their aid? How can I not hope they have the chance to be who they _are,_ rather than who they were? 

Perhaps I shall even manage the same myself. 

I shake my head, and push back from the table, the scrape of my chair raw against the floor. "Thank you for the drinks, serahs." 

They none of them say farewell, and I gather their silence around me as I go, a cloak weighing against my shoulders all the way to my room, to the balcony where I can finally rest, nothing left of me but the quiet, and the stars far above. 


End file.
